MASCA, or the Museum Applied Science Center for Archaeology, was established in 1961 by a grant from the National Science Foundation. MASCA was modeled after the Research Laboratory for Archaeology and the History of Art in Oxford. From the time of its inception in 1961, MASCA, along with the Radiocarbon Laboratory, made a number of contributions to radiocarbon dating and other dating and materials analysis techniques including thermoluminescence, xeroradiography, Proton Induced X-ray Emission (PIXE) analysis of metals, analysis of faunal and plant remains and other projects either within the museum or remotely at archaeological sites. MASCA was disassembled in 2009.
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